Semiconductor materials may be based on various materials. For example, some common semiconductor materials may be silicon (Si) or germanium (Ge) based. Si and Ge may be commonly utilized to make semiconductor devices. For example, semiconductor devices made by MOS processes, such as an insulated gate field-effect transistor (IGFET), may utilize the electrical properties of Si. In particular, many semiconductor devices utilize the electrical carrier abilities of Si. Accordingly, Si is commonly used as a substrate, upon which, various semiconductor devices are formed.
As semiconductor devices become increasingly complex, the demand on the electrical carrier abilities of the semiconductor materials increases. For example, an increase in semiconductor complexity often requires increase in semiconductor performance and power consumption.
It may be possible to address the increased demands on the electrical carrier abilities in a semiconductor by modifying the atomic structure of the semiconductor. One known method of modifying the atomic structure of a semiconductor is to form a thin layer of Si on a layer of SiGe film by a form of epitaxial growth. The layer of Si has a lattice structure that differs from that of the layer of SiGe, and this lattice mismatch results in the Si layer being strained. That is, because of the natural tendency of atoms to align with one another, the layer of Si will strain to match the layer of SiGe. However, the lattice mismatch processes for forming layers of strained Si may be complex because of the requirement of controlling dislocations that may commonly occur due to the lattice mismatch.